Violin shopping, one year later

January 4, 2007 at 6:27 AM

Happy New Year to everyone! I haven't blogged here in a while, mostly because there hasn't been much to report. I've been struggling with neck and shoulder pain in the last several months, so my practicing and the frequency of my lessons have gone way down. But through a combination of physical therapy, chiropractic treatment, and changes in my chin and shoulder rests, things are finally starting to get better.

Some of you might recall that a little over a year ago, I decided to upgrade my violin outfit but ended up just buying a new bow. The bow served me nicely through 2006. With another year-end bonus (one benefit that thankfully hasn't been slashed in this era of cost-cutting) to add to my savings, I decided I was ready to upgrade the instrument...or was I?

I took yesterday off work to visit Kamimoto Strings in San Jose, the largest string shop in the vicinity and a favorite hangout of fellow V.com member Clare Chu (in fact, that's where I met her for the first time). I told the staff member first to give me instruments in the $5-6000 range. She brought out several; a few had potential, including one gorgeous piece with red varnish and no price label that put the others to shame, at least in physical appearance. Needless to say, it was the favorite of my three-year-old Kiera, whom I'd brought with me to see if she was ready to move up to a 1/16 (which she is).

Just for fun, I then pushed my price range up to about $8K, and found a couple more I liked, including a Scott Cao for $6500 and a Ming-Jiang Zhu for $7800. Oh, and the beautiful red violin? Turns out it was from their Cremona exhibition (can't remember the maker now) and going for a whopping $12K. Beauty has its price. I don't know why they even gave it to me! I could afford it, if I really wanted to, but I feel somewhat uncomfortable upgrading my current instrument by an entire order of magnitude.

Which leads me to my real dilemma, I suppose. Maybe I'm not actually ready for a new violin. I feel like getting one, for a number of reasons; the violin I play on now is one I've had for 20 years (it cost my parents $1200 in 1986), I've improved as a violinist enough that I think I deserve a better instrument---though perhaps not that much better---and I can afford it. If I don't spend this money on a new violin, it'll just go to pay the mortgage or the credit card bill or something boring like that. And yet, the practical side of me wonders whether it's really wise to buy a new violin for just a marginal improvement in my sound. Not to mention the choice of WHICH violin to buy, if I end up buying one. Since I'm a perfectionist in such matters, I feel as if I should check out all my options, which means going back up to Ifshin in Berkeley, a trip I loathe. Argh! Big purchases stress me out! I feel like handing over a wad of cash to someone I trust and saying, "Here, pick one for me" except that I wouldn't really trust anyone to do that...I mean, it's like choosing a spouse. Maybe I just need to play the field a little longer until the right choice becomes apparent.

I suppose one useful thing did come out of my trip, which is that after trying so many violins, I can now finally put on my Kun shoulder rest with one hand!

From Karen Allendoerfer
Posted on January 4, 2007 at 12:23 PM

Hi Karin,

I'm in a similar position to you--only the violin I play (also bought for me for ~$1200 by my parents--my first "real" full-size violin) was bought in 1978! I'm kind of attached to it because of that, and because it was bought from my then-teacher, who passed away about 5 years ago, and playing it still reminds me of him and I like that.

Nonetheless, based on the viola I rented, I'm pretty convinced that for me, a new instrument would be more than a marginal improvement in sound. Every time I play the two consecutively I'm really struck by how much richer and warmer the viola sounds . . . I still don't really know if it's the instrument or the viola personality, but whatever it is, I'm convinced.

So I'm probably going to buy a viola, not a violin, in the spring when they have their "double your rental credit" sale. That'll give me over $600 in rental credit.

How did you decide on the price range you were interested in? $5-6K seems a bit high to me (I was thinking $3-4K) but what the hey. I can totally understand the "do I really *need* this?" feeling. I could also probably afford up to 12K and even more, but then you get into these trade-offs. Maybe I'd get more out of lessons with a good teacher, bi-weekly or weekly. Then there's the kids' college, etc.

I'm glad you blogged about this process! Keep talking!

Regards,
Karen

p.s. Did you play Fantasia at church? How did it go?

From Jim W. Miller
Posted on January 4, 2007 at 2:18 PM

A couple years ago I was thinking about buying a flashy sports car. I told my co-worker it wasn't practical. He said you're too old to be practical. So I was going to buy it, till I decided I was also too poor to be flashy. Besides, everywhere I went in it I'd be yelling out hi midlife crisis here. After that comes the comb over. Then the dirt bath.

From Emily Liz
Posted on January 4, 2007 at 4:29 PM

I relate...I came into a shop in Minneapolis just intending to look over the inventory and get a feel for the staff. I walked out with a beautiful red violin from the Cremona exhibition, "just to try." Whoops, hehe. A series of strange things happened after that (long long LONG story) and amazingly, a couple of months later, the instrument was mine. It is a tremendous joy to open the case and see it - not just as an instrument, but as a visual work of art. It'll be two years in March and I've never regretted the decision, as flighty and irresponsible as it seemed at the time. Food for thought.

I think once you've found one you really like, it can be difficult to try others out, even if you know you should, because the first achieves this mythic status in your head, rightly or wrongly. That's tough. But I've seen others work around it.

Anyway, my sympathies about the Cremona exhibition instruments. They are all bewitching.

From Tom Holzman
Posted on January 4, 2007 at 4:43 PM

You are unlikely to lose anything by looking around except that in the interim you might nickel and dime away the bonus on other things. You should go to Ifshin as much as you hate the trip just to see what else is out there. There are no easy answers. I was lucky. When I was 16, my teacher, who was one of the two or three best violinists in France at the time, spent an afternoon at his luthier picking out the violin I still play 40 years later. Good luck!

From Karin Lin
Posted on January 5, 2007 at 6:24 AM

Hi Karen, my price range was kind of a random process based first on the "triple the cost of your current violin" and "triple the cost of your bow" rules of thumb I read somewhere, then I kind of pushed it up for fun. But now I'm thinking that I don't want to buy...I haven't fallen in love with anything yet, and I'm not dissatisfied with my violin. And I hate, HATE the shopping process. (Yeah, Tom, I know I should go to Ifshin. Yuck.)

I backed out of playing Fantasia because my holiday schedule got too crazy, but the pianist wants to do it some other time, so I'll be coming to you for tips. :)

From Clare Chu
Posted on January 6, 2007 at 5:06 PM

Hi Karin! It's your friend the violin-shopaholic. I love going around and trying violins and will be glad to help you play any violins for your evaluation. My first serious violin was also my most expensive. I went to the Cremona show at Kamimotos back in 2004 and fell in love with the Luca Salvadori there. It was the second most expensive violin, the first was already sold. I tried to walk away several times during that week, by trying other violins that were less expensive, but at the end, I knew that my heart would not be satisfied unless I got what my heart desired. Now that I've got my true love violin, I felt free to go around trying and buying lesser violins just for fun and learning about violin characteristics. I recently helped a friend make a decision on two violins he was trialing from a VSA winner. It was a lot of fun playing through different types of music and letting him hear it from a distance and up close.

Shops can be intimidating, but don't feel like it is do or die! The purpose of the shop visit is to narrow down the field. Play everything there that you have the stamina for, then check out the one or two (if they let you), to take home. Then, in the calmness of your own home (or maybe not so calm if you have young children), you can just let the violin click with you or not (no pressure). Take it with you to orchestra, lessons and church. You'll know whether you can live with it or not, and also become aware of shortcomings that you cannot be able to judge while at the shop with 50 other violins hanging around staring at you!

From Terez Mertes
Posted on January 7, 2007 at 11:24 PM

Hey, Karin! Well, enjoy the merry-go-round of emotion. God knows I rode that plenty when I was shopping around for my violin, although the stakes were lower for me.

Good luck, and before deciding, do go to Roland Feller's shop in San Francisco, as well. And play one or two of the antique instruments, just for fun - they're good about letting people do that.

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Violin shopping, one year later

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